When Half Gods Go
by MyMadness
Summary: Something had changed. Mary agreed with Lou on that.  But she wouldn't say just what it was. She wouldn't bring up the pity-inducing men she had dated. Or the nights spent unhappily alone. Besides, she was not the only one who was different now. COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1

**When Half Gods Go.**

**I have really enjoyed reading the stories here. And I can only hope mine makes a good addition. **

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><p>Mary stared into the drawer full of perfectly organized files and admitted she had nothing else to work on that night. With a sigh, she gave the drawer a dissatisfied shove. She looked over at the doorway to her boss' office then, and couldn't help but chastise herself. She had stayed late all week hoping to get up the courage to ask Lou Grant out.<p>

All week the two of them had been together after everyone else had left. And it hadn't worked yet.

Feeling defeated, she pushed her chair back to leave.

"Mary?" she heard Lou call, and when she looked up she realized he was already walking from his office toward her desk.

"Yes?"

"Why are you here?" he said in his low gentle tone.

"It's complicated," she managed.

"You don't think you'd be happier if you spent less time here? You know ... get out. Find a hobby... Find a..."

"_**You're**_ still here. You aren't out there." She was not accusing him, but she was looking for something to explain these nights he'd stayed late as well.

"I _**was**_ out there. I did marriage. The Marines. I even did getting blown up. I don't recommend some of those," he said, slyly.

"But...why are you still here? Tonight?" she asked him, feeling braver.

"I'm here in case you..." He stopped himself and looked up at the ceiling. "Mary? What do you want?"

"Why do you think I want something?" _Have I been that obvious, _she was asking.

"You've been wearing flats for two weeks. I noticed. We've actually been the same height. And your usual 4 trips to my office each day has turned into an average of 6. Today it was 7."

"Oh, yeah?" she countered, feeling challenged "Murray told me you have no reason to work late this week. He can't think why you'd be here every evening."

"Oh, Murray said that, did he?" Lou shook his head as the accusing words came out. "Well, he told me you have a crush on someone at the station."

Mary was paralyzed for a moment. And when no good response came to her, she fired back with "Everyone thinks that." Before she could think better of it, she added, "Then there is that rumor that I sort of revere you, but won't act on it because you are on this pedestal."

"You would have to have a strange notion of what belongs on a pedestal," he whispered.

She shook her head. "I think you're a wonderful man," she told him just as quietly.

"But something must have changed. Certainly, I was just this wonderful 6 months ago," he joked.

_Something must have changed_. Mary agreed with him. But she wouldn't say just what it was.

She would not bring up the pity-inducing men whom she had dated over the last year. Or the nights spent unhappily alone.

Besides, she was not the only one who was different now. Somehow Lou had changed, too. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, he'd become quietly... accessible. The emotion in him and the caring had become more evident to her.

It had all become steadily more obvious, until one day Mary decided Lou Grant was a man who was waiting -even trying - to be noticed.

That man leaned against her desk to be next to her now, and his hand fell to cover hers. "This isn't the kind of thing that comes at all easily for me. You know that."

"I know." She shrugged then. "Do you want dinner? I've been trying to invite you over all week."

He smiled weakly and nodded. "I'll get my coat."

/ / / / /


	2. Chapter 2

_**A/N: The chapters will get longer after this. I did not want to mix this with anything else though.**_

/ / / / /

They drove their separate cars to her apartment. Once in her living room, he threw his suit coat over her couch and pulled off his tie. She smiled while he did. These were the little things that endeared him to her. And then there was the timber to his voice. The rugged look he had. The supposed simplicity to him when he was, she had grown to understand, anything but simple.

They were staring at each other now. Staring and then looking away. Everything was quite ordinary on the surface. But they were clearly in new territory already.

Her mouth had gone dry, and even she could tell her pulse was thudding faster.

"Has this become uncomfortable?" she asked with a self conscious wince.

"Maybe ... 'surreal' is the word?" He took a nervous swipe at his forehead.

"I have a theory," she told him swallowing hard.

"Okay."

"Because it is quite possible we have worked together for so long that anything else between us will just feel..."

"Ridiculous? Foolish?" he supplied too easily.

She nodded. "So, if I kiss you..." She eased closer as if afraid to startle him.

"Right. If you can kiss me and not laugh or..."

"Oh, be quiet!" she told him, smiling now.

"Make me," he teased.

Was he flirting with her? Because it felt... _Good_, she realized. She chuckled despite her nerves.

"You are laughing already. See?" he pretended to complain.

He was up against the back of the couch now. Happy to have something to brace himself against. Even if he was able to joke with her, he was quite nearly unnerved.

She was really going to do this, he realized as she stepped toward him. Mary was so close now he could hear the hush sound of her breath. She had ducked her head to avoid his eyes, and she had left just an inch between them.

Rather than endure any more of this torturous wait, he leaned into her and kissed her cheek. Kissing her on the cheek, that was something he had done before. But, his lips lingered there tonight.

Her hands moved to his arms, and it seemed natural when his hands landed at her waist.

The moment felt suspended. They could have been dancing, he thought. But the only time he had ever danced with a woman like this. Danced so close. So slowly. He had been thinking of taking that woman to bed. But he had no idea what he was thinking now. He was trying very, very hard not to think at all.

Her hand was at his cheek now, tenderly letting him know she approved. Mary appreciated him being the one to make that first move.

She fumbled her try at a first real kiss then. Catching him only on the corner of his mouth.

Instead of correcting the kiss, rather than admit any error existed, Lou moved his lips to her neck. She started to stammer something. And he shushed her quickly and kissed her again. And then once more.

God knows, he had never kissed Mary Richards like _this_ before.

It was undeniably sensual and forthright. Quiet, but clear in meaning. It was unexpectedly wonderful - just like the man himself, Mary was thinking.

Her head lolled with the sensation. She tipped her chin further back to allow his kisses to travel. And her thumb traced delicately at his ear.

When he eased back, she smiled at him. But she didn't think she could dare say anything.

Still, she wanted to know if she could possibly kiss him the way he had her. If she could make him feel the things she was.

"Mary?" He started to say. But she had her mind on her task. She put her finger tips to his lips. She leaned in then to kiss at his neck, happy (as he had noted) that they were the same height just now. She pressed in tighter against him, wanting to feel more of him. And she touched just the tip of her tongue to his skin.

He breathed hard then and unconsciously tightened the grasp he had on her.

He stopped her. Compulsion had not let him even weigh the thought. He moved to kiss her on the mouth. And there were three kisses then – kisses that she would always remember.

The first was like so much targeting. Just quick and overly precise. And then they kissed each other fully for the longest time. It was part hunger then and joy. And ever so much simple relief.

Finally, there was a shared move towards calm. Something of a well-practiced lovers' kiss. Slow. Liquid. Confident and self-satisfied.

Until, at last, they let that kiss end.

"Dinner, Mary?" he asked with manufactured innocence as they stood there, forehead to forehead.

/


	3. Chapter 3

_**A/N: Thanks so much for reading! I really appreciate the reviews. **_

_**I haven't watched this show since it was originally aired. And I was just a kid then. I went back tonight and watched a few snippets on YouTube. Oy. This show feels different when you are all grown up.**_

/ / / / / / / / / / / / /

Lou watched as she made dinner for them. She busied herself with getting the water started on the stove and then pulling things from the freezer. They were both too quiet. They both drank their wine and very consciously tried not to act nervous. He stopped himself when he realized he was actually pacing behind her.

Once to the table, he was unsure if he should reach out and take her hand over dinner. He had not forgotten how to be with a woman, but he had quite assuredly forgotten how to date – if he had ever known.

They talked about work a little. About upcoming projects. And they talked about local things, much of it off shoots of stories they had run. Mary threw in some questions about the Vikings, and he smiled at her knowingly. She was trying too hard, he thought. But that was Mary.

"That was a great dinner," he told her, finally.

"It was just meat balls and sauce I made up last weekend," she said literally deflecting the compliment with a wave of her hands. But she was smiling.

Walking behind him as she took the plates to the kitchen, she felt an urge to kiss him right there on the top of his head. If her hands hadn't been full, she would have at least run a hand over his shoulder as she passed by. She was wishing now that she had touched him during dinner.

With dinner finished, she worried about how the evening would end. She told herself she wouldn't ask if she could see him over the weekend. But she was a nervous wreck wondering whether or not he would ask to see her.

It would not have been that out of the ordinary for them to do something together. At least once a month or so, the two of them would see each other outside of work. For dinner. A movie. Some social function.

Before, it wouldn't have meant anything if he did or didn't ask to see her at some point in the coming weekend.

But tonight it meant everything.

"Lou?" she said from the kitchen. And the first time she did that, called him by his first name, she made sure she was not looking at him. Or him at her.

"Hmm?" he said back from his spot at the table. It seemed she had interrupted his thoughts.

"Bring your glass in to the kitchen. I can pour you more wine if you want."

"I'll help with the dishes," he told her as he came in.

"You don't need to..."

"Maybe if I keep my hands busy and have something else to do, I can stop worrying that I am about to make a complete fool out of myself."

She appreciated that admission. And so she stopped what she was doing and leaned on the cupboard to look at him. "That bad?"

He shook his head and waited to answer. "No. That good." There was a long pause then. "If things don't work, I don't want you to think it is your fault."

"It wouldn't be yours, either," she told him. And deciding it would be better if they both had something to focus on other than themselves and whatever was between them, she filled the sink with soap and water.

Finally, the words came. "Are you busy this weekend?" he asked.

"Just errands to do," Mary answered. She smiled at him to ease the conversation for him. "Do you want to do something? Together?" she asked for him.

"I'd like that."

With that mine field behind them, it was easier when it was time for him to leave. She handed him his coat. Smiled too much. And then walked him to the door. The kisses were easier then, too. Quick and uncomplicated, but full of meaning still.

/ / / /

It was a perfectly ordinary call to Rhoda a little over a week later, ordinary until Mary blurted out, "I kissed Lou."

"Lou Grant?" came the stunned sounding reply.

"Yes."

"Kissed him?" Rhoda repeated. "Like... Hello. Goodbye? Mazel tov?"

"I kissed him like an insane woman who was going to crawl into his pockets," Mary admitted.

"And he was conscious for this?"

This earned Rhoda a disapproving silence.

"Sorry, Mary," Rhoda said then. "Really. But you've floored me here, and I am dying for details. You go silent on me, and I am flying back tonight to get answers!"

"Yes. He was conscious," Mary finally confirmed, laughing.

"And when you saw each other again in the office was there this rush of second thoughts and awkward excuses? That sort of thing?"

"No," Mary said, as if that had occurred to her too. "It might have been a _little_ awkward, but there were no excuses. He just very quietly asked if he could see me again that week, and so I invited him over to have dinner for that night."

"So, when did all this start?"

"It was 10 days ago," Mary told her.

"It took you 10 days to call me? What's been going on all that time?"

"I've seen him about every other night since then. We have dinner either here or out or at his place." There was a sort of shrug in the words.

"And there is some kind of chemistry here?"

"We like the same movies. We can talk for hours... He's funny..." Mary supplied.

"_**Chemistry**_, Mary?" Rhoda stressed. "What about..."

"Oh God, Rhoda," the usually mild mannered woman replied as she coughed out a laugh. "He is one _**hell**_ of a kisser."

Rhoda cheered.

/ / / / / / / / / / / / /

There had been the one transition, Mary thought two weeks later. A huge one, yes. They had gone from being friends to dating. Four weeks in and they were most definitely 'romantically involved.' Even if they had decided not to make this knowledge public.

But that next transition nagged at her. Would they become a couple who slept together? Who would initiate it, she wondered. Would it be more spontaneous than the first kiss?

Mary had spent way too much time in relationships noting the 'rounding of the bases' not to feel compelled to qualify and quantify everything between them.

She and Lou had conquered kissing, she decided. And their kisses were not always chaste. They often pressed against each other as they stood by the door, but they had avoided anything more.

He could turn her to putty with the way he touched her, but he had kept it almost innocuous. There might be a hand to her knee, he might pat her thigh, his fingers would travel across her neck, yes. Or even squeeze at her hip bones. But he had never touched her in a way that could be deemed**_ too_** intimate.

Mary was thinking about all of that as she vacuumed her place on a Saturday. She was surprised when the doorbell rang and it was him. She had not expected Lou till that evening. More surprising was the state of him. He looked decidedly worse for the wear, leaning against her door jamb in sweats. His sweat shirt was cut off at mid sleeve, and the man was head-to-toe filthy.

"Lou?" she merely said.

"I was in your park," he gestured with his thumb over his shoulder.

"Were you mugged?" she asked half seriously.

He gave her that crooked smile she loved then.

"That's what it felt like," he told her. "Once a year some of the guys get together and play touch football."

"You seem to have gotten touched pretty hard."

"Right into the ground," he confirmed.

She latched on to a small bit of shirt near his collar that was clean and tugged lightly to bring him over the threshold. His steps were painfully stiff.

He came to a halt as he looked at her pristine apartment. His second thoughts were obvious. "I should just go," he told her with a sad shake of the head.

"You don't look like you would make it," she joked. "Just take off your shoes and stand there a minute. Please?"

She walked into her bedroom and returned with two towels. She threw the larger one on the couch to give him a place to sit down. The smaller one she had wet he could see, and he worried she meant to use it to mop at his face for him.

He took half a step toward her, faltered and grimaced.

"Where does it hurt?" she asked.

"Everywhere," he nearly growled, but it seemed to be his knee she decided.

"Oh, Lou, what am I going to do with you?" She got the dirt off his hands and handed him the towel so he could clean his face. Together then they got him to sit on the couch.

"I'll get some ice," she told him.

She was feeling possessive and maternal, she realized as she spied on him from her kitchen. It was killing her not to fuss over him more, not to tell him he was forbidden from playing football again.

He must have read half of that in her expression when she joined him on the couch. "Really, I just need a shower," he claimed.

There was a long pause.

"Do that here," she finally offered.

"I've got nothing to change into."

"I'll wash your clothes," Mary said with a shrug.

"And I'll end up sitting around in a towel while they dry," he complained. "Besides, I was going to watch the Michigan - Chapel Hill game."

"I'm not gonna tell you what to do. I'm just making you an offer. Once we get you out of the shower, I'll feed you lunch. Then we can get you set up in my bed with your knee up and iced. And there's a TV in there so we can watch the game." Mary rattled this off quickly- obviously without any thought as to what it would sound like once it was out.

Lou's mouth popped open, but he didn't manage a reply.

"I just made all of this between us unbelievably uncomfortable... didn't I?" she said a wince.


	4. Chapter 4

_**A/N: This gets quite T. It is mostly smoke and mirrors, and hints and cues, but still... it is scandalous :) and (if I did it right) hot and bothered. Thank SO much for reading.**_

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><p>She'd mentioned a shower. A bed. Getting him IN the bed, and the idea that she would be joining him there. Forget the fact that the words had not actually been an invitation for anything physical, there was no way to stop thinking those things now.<p>

"I understand," he said with a smile. "Really, I know you meant that... well, innocently, and I..."

She was blushing and settling back on the couch to be farther from him. "Oh, don't be too sure my subconscious wasn't working to make things... interesting."

"If it's not too much trouble... I'll stay. Okay?" he said. "And we'll just ignore your subconscious... and mine."

/ / / / / / / / /

She would not have believed such a thing possible a month ago, but 45 minutes later, Lou Grant was sitting at her table in a towel and an over sized Vikings T-shirt that she sometimes slept in.

Well, it was over sized on her, she thought with a quick glance at him.

And then with only a few quips back and forth about kilts, Lou was gingerly climbing onto her bed while she went to check on his laundry.

"I've got more ice for you," she told him when she returned.

"I like my ice in a DRINK," he pretended to complain.

"That's my next trip," she told him. She sat on the edge of the bed and gingerly put the bag of ice on his knee. "And your clothes will be out in 15 minutes. So, get comfortable," she chided with a friendly look.

"I can't get comfortable if you fuss over me," he grumbled.

"I'm not..." She paused then and let out an audible sigh. "I am, aren't I?" she conceded.

He started to grin and push her from the bed. She managed to land on her feet, but she gave him a scandalous look.

"What?" she insisted.

"This is my side of the bed. And besides, I need that drink. Hey, throw in two aspirin, and I will be the best house guest you ever had."

"I think I should charge..."

"That's disgusting," he teased. As he grinned at Mary, he knew she would also be thinking of her friend, Sherry, who, where men was concerned, was a professional.

Mary cocked her head at him. "I meant I wanted a kiss!"

"I know. I know." And he was laughing now because he knew he had gotten the better of her. "Come 'ere."

She leaned over him and kissed him soundly.

"How long till the game?" he whispered.

"We have an hour."

"God, that's a completely inconvenient amount of time... in so many ways," he mumbled as he watched her head back to the kitchen.

/ / / / / / / / / / /

Mary did another trip back and forth, and finally reappeared with his laundry.

When he stood to take his clothes from her, he seemed horribly stiff. She moved in close to help him up. And as his arms wrapped around her waist, she admitted to herself that she had pressed this close in part because she had wanted the chance to touch him.

"Careful," came his suggestive tones at her ear. "Or we'll lose this towel."

The bed. The lack of proper clothes. The jokes. The way his voice had hitched as he touched her. It was all screaming _'sex_.' And that was a topic they had worked hard to avoid.

She was blushing suddenly as she leaned away.

"Mary. Talk to me," he said, apologetically.

"Not on your life," she deflected. "I'll be back in a couple minutes. You get dressed," she said pointedly.

She seemed recovered from her embarrassment when she returned. She climbed into bed on the far side.

Lou was flat on his back now with his hands clasped over his chest. He looked comfortable, she thought, but also a bit like a man on a psychiatrist's couch.

"What do you think?" he said, as if addressing the ceiling.

He hadn't asked, _'what do you think about us and sex?',_ but she answered the question as if he had.

"I think about it a great deal," she admitted.

"Do people talk through this sort of thing nowadays or just..."

"We should talk about it enough for you to know I'm serious about you," Mary told him quietly.

"Me too." He pressed his lips together nervously. "You suppose we'll last?" It was the type of question one bruised soul could only ask of another.

"I've done your laundry. You are in my bed. And I _still_ like talking to you. So, you have out lasted the majority of the men I've been out with," she kidded.

She thought about those men as she looked at the unlikely form of her boss and friend lying atop her comforter.

There had been the men who had made the push for a quick trip to bed. Or there was that other vibe where she was being evaluated as a potential wife and mother. There were those men who were looking for someone as married to their expectations as to them.

It was different with Lou.

They seemed to roll towards one another at the same time through some shared need for contact.

He kissed her then. And skimmed a hand down her thigh. He pulled her tighter to him and pulled her knee to rest over his hip.

When Lou finally did say something, it was not a crass request, but rather an apology and an offer to leave.

"Don't go," she responded quickly. And then she thought about what a strange day it had been with him arriving unannounced. She thought about the evasive way Lou was acting suddenly. "Wait a minute... are you feeling guilty about being here or something? Was this some kind of test today?" she asked him quietly.

"I'm sorry, Mary," he said by way of admission. "I didn't plan it as a test, if that makes sense. But there's this part of me that figures this will never last. That maybe you were only seeing me on my best behavior. Or that you'd expect me to change. Be a model boyfriend. Well, sometimes I'm just a sorry mess. I think I needed you to know that."

"I don't need you to change."

He smiled and leaned in to kiss her. "You don't need me to change? Not even my ties? You can be honest about that one," he joked quickly as he petted at her cheek. And then his next words were strangely tender. "Because, for some reason, I actually like it when you pick out my tie before we go out."

"And I like that we take turns choosing where to go. I love that you always kiss me before we get out of the car."

"I wouldn't want to change that."

"Michigan and Chapel Hill," Mary tried to remind him.

/ / / / / /

At half time there were snacks, and then she watched a bit of the second half with him. But mostly she cooked their dinner.

It was awkward then once dinner was over.

She didn't want him to go. She was obsessed with that thought as they stood by the kitchen sink together.

"Do you want to put your knee up?" she asked. He had grimaced a bit and shifted his weight to lean against her cupboards.

"Can we just lie back down ... Together," he said, carefully as he took a dish from her. "For a bit. I know I've overstayed my welcome...

"You haven't," she said firmly.

"Could we talk?"

The corners of her mouth turned up at him and she nodded. Then she took his hand and walked with him to the bedroom.

They did talk. Mostly about how well the day had gone and about how much they enjoyed being together.

Mary even tried to mention the game, but he told her, "I don't want to talk about football, Mary." And he shook his head at her knowingly.

He watched the expression on her face and it got less confused, less unsure, but she never seemed to come around to his way of thinking that he could tell. So, he kissed her.

"This is better. I didn't want to tell you 'I love you' in a kitchen full of dirty dishes," he managed uneasily.

She smiled and ducked her head because she couldn't say anything for a moment. "I love you, too," she told him happily once she had recovered. She bit at her lip for a second then. "I didn't want to tell you until I knew how you felt... I hoped you'd tell me."

/ / / / /

They were kissing then. And in an unguarded moment, she pressed tightly against him.

He had responded to her, she knew. She felt it in the kisses. In the touches that passed between them. His body wanted hers.

But he wasn't pushing for anything more. In fact, he had slowed the whole tempo of their tryst. He kissed her languidly. So gently now. And he stroked her back with care.

His physical response alone would have prompted half the men she had been out with to try their luck and ask her for sex.

"Is this making you uncomfortable?" she wanted to know when he pulled back.

He shook his head, angry with every idiot she had ever gone out with.

He had tried to shift her, to not let her press against him _there _so that she wouldn't know just how much he wanted her. But she knew. And some idiot in her past had trained her to feel somehow responsible. Or obligated.

"I don't want you to think I... Look. I'm a grown up, Mary. You don't need to worry about me so much," he told her.

And whether she worried about it or not, she needed to explain...

"It's been a long time," she whispered, tensely.

"For me, too," he agreed, even though she didn't need him to. "It's been forever since I've wanted to spend the night with a woman."

"I meant, it's been a long time and anything in my bathroom even resembling a contraceptive will have expired..."

"Shhh. It's all right." And she knew somehow that this man understood. That he would not make her explain any more. And most importantly, she knew that he loved her. "Hey, don't worry," he said then. "Tonight will give us some time to get used to the idea. Of us. And this."

Xxx

They'd gotten ready for bed. The lights were off now and the pair were settled under the covers. Mary wondered how they would handle this. She worried a bit.

He seemed so at ease with the situation. "I want to spend the night with you to spend the night with you," he said in his no nonsense way. "It's not about the sex."

She knew too many men who would have told her it was too frustrating. They would have left by now. Or acted unhappy about her not being on the Pill.

"I love you," she told him. And she burrowed in tighter to him, passing her hands under his shirt to touch his warm skin.

In measured steps they claimed the distance between them. She smiled into his neck, all her unease forgotten. Somehow, this man made impossible things seem simple and obvious and right.

"Will you let me touch you?" he whispered. And she knew he meant to touch her in a way he never had before.

"Yes." There was a pause before his fingers teased under the waist band of her pajama bottoms. He shifted then and moved to unbutton her top. Her hands met his there and they soon had the garment off her.

It was lovely. He was amazing. The nervousness melted away with the gentle way his fingers explored across her. And as she responded to him, pushing against him, he worked perfectly to meet that growing need in her.

"I love you," he said firmly, as she tensed and then fell to him.

/ / /

"Good?" he wondered far later when her eyes opened again and her breathing had leveled.

She chuckled. "You sound smug!"

"I'm feeling smug," he said as he pushed her hair back. "I've done something to make you even more beautiful."

He kissed at her collar bone and pressed hard against her then.

"Let me touch you," she suggested quietly. There was mischief in her voice then. "I'm much more gentle than those guys you played football with..."

"Mmmm," he agreed. And he nodded his head at her neck.

"Take it all off," she told him, sounding saucy.

"Oh, yeah?" he asked.

"I don't want you making any more laundry."

He chucked his clothes hard against her bedroom door rather than just placing them on the floor beside the bed. But that was the adrenaline in him talking.

"I suppose you had some place specific you wanted me to put those," he asked as a worried after thought.

"I think you did fine. Now come here."

She found him out, and then shifted to lie fully beneath him. She stroked him and pressed him to her. With her other hand to his hip, she encouraged him to move against her.

"I want to make you..." she whispered.

He groaned low in his throat. "Oh, you will, Mary. God, just like that," he told her.

/


	5. Chapter 5

**_A/N: Hmmm, the 70s. So much of the MTM show is timeless, and then an awful lot just has to stay in the 70s. So, our couple here is stuck in a world largely without 24 hour pharmacies. Where everything was closed on Sundays. A world without Walmart! Where lots of things that are over-the-counter today were not. Even taking the Pill was more complicated only a 2 decades ago. (I make no claim to knowing anything about that in the 70s...) You didn't start it just whenever. It was always the Sunday after your cycle... and blah blah blah. Not random thoughts. It all fits into the plot here._**

* * *

><p>The tap turned off. There was the sound of the towel rod shifting. Finally, the door squeaked open, and there was a man's soft groan.<p>

A blurry look at the clock told her it was 2 am. Mary was awake now - awake enough to process most of that ...

Awake enough to remember -

That her boss had kissed her senseless last night.

Had seen her naked.

Had heard her call out, past need.

And had helped her make a mess of these sheets.

They were way beyond dating, suddenly.

This would be a predictable time for the famed Mary Richards self-doubt to rear up... But she wouldn't let it, she decided.

"Lou," she called out. "Leave the bathroom light on if you want. There's no need to navigate in the dark." A bit of doubt did touch her then. Perhaps any conversation they were about to have would be better held in the dark?

"We okay?" Lou wondered, as he approached the bed.

Going just on non-verbal cues here, he thought, perhaps, they were. She lifted the covers for him as he climbed back into bed, and then she curled toward him once he was lying down.

Good signs, he hoped.

"I think we are okay," she answered, cautiously.

"Good. Good," he murmured. And he cast an arm around her and pulled her a little tighter. There was a quick but awkward silence then, one that he leapt into. "You put your pajamas back on," he teased lightly.

"It seemed a little presumptuous to just stay naked. I was hedging my bets in case you..."

"In case I woke up and decided all of this was a mistake?" He laughed at his own behavior quietly. "I was worried, too. That's why I asked you if we were okay." He kissed the top of her head. "I want you to know, I am exactly where I want to be. I swear."

His fingers seemed intent on finding skin as they lay there. Finally, his hand settled at the gap above her bottoms.

She passed an appreciative hand down his flank before she hooked her finger into his shorts. "I see you found your clothes, too."

"Some hard working elf must have gotten up and put everything on the chair for me."

"I love you," she told him (as if that explained the occurrence.)

"I love you, too."

"All this," she said, clearly meaning the new intimacy, "It does make being at the office together more of a problem."

"Very simple rules," he assured her.

"Oh, yeah?"

"No sex at work."

She groaned at his less than helpful reply. "How did I know you would say that?"

"Sorry." He paused before continuing. "When you opened the door to me yesterday, this was not on the agenda..." he said then. He was allowing that even if there were no regrets, there might be misgivings.

"True. But before we even sat down to dinner, I knew I wanted you to stay. I wanted you here. I just didn't know if it would turn out right. And I wanted a first night together to be right."

"This wasn't right?"

"You made it _very_ right," she told him without hesitation.

He lay there with her in his arms, and he willed her to do more than just say what he wanted to hear.

And she did.

As she moved to be over him, he strained up toward her, not wanting to wait to kiss her. He met her lips in an action that was hard and full. There was a moment's worry in him that he had caught her off guard with the force of his desire. But she proved herself to be just as eager with the way she returned his kisses and leaned into him.

She moaned as she eased away from him. "I wish we could..." she started, only to trail off softly.

"It's going to be a long weekend."

And there were butterflies in his stomach then as he thought about what he believed they were saying. They were setting a date - Monday - when they could fix their 'contraceptive problem.' On Monday, they could answer this need. Fully.

"You've been a good sport. A gentleman," she told him. It was a tennis lob. And Lou knew it was less of a compliment than it was a request for a certain reply.

So, he rolled them so that he was full on her – so that the weight of him was urging her to understand what he was thinking.

"I will act like a gentleman. But I still want you. Don't think this is some luke warm sort of thing..." He breathed hard before he finished with, "Is that what you wanted to hear?"

"I think so," she said.

"You appreciate that I have this grown-up ability for restraint, but you still want to know what I am feeling?"

"Yes."

And so, with tantalizing slowness, he pulled her one knee out from under him and wrapped it at his waist. She moaned softly to feel him there, warm and hard and intimate against her. He pressed at her more fully, as if he would let his hips do the talking. And then he bit at her neck before he whispered in her ear, "I want to be inside you. God, I do. I want to do all of this. Completely. The right way."

His voice, those words, all of it dripping with need... he had dialed straight to her sex without even trying.

Suddenly, he was trailing kisses along the margin of her pajama top, and she was lost to simply enjoying the sensations.

"Help me out," he suggested.

"Hmmm?" came her distracted reply.

"Unbutton this."

And she did.

/ / / / / / / / /

Later, his lips were at her hip bone. He placed one more kiss there to mark the sigh she let up as her trembling stopped.

"Mary?"

Given the bit of light that spilled from the bathroom, he could see her eyes were closed. And despite the shadows, it was plain she was smiling with satisfaction.

"Have you ever read Cosmo?" she asked in a faraway voice.

"I stopped when my subscription ran out."

"Funny man." She laughed at herself then. "It's just that I read an article about this. This quick sort of overwhelming... full body, um, reaction."

"I though Cosmo was all about orgasms," he teased as he moved to lie next to her.

"Orgasm," she tried out the word.

"You are shy with me," he whispered. "Still."

"It's not you. I wouldn't normally say 'orgasm' even if I was alone."

"Well, who says 'orgasm' when they are all by themselves?" he mused.

"Shhh," she scolded, weakly. "I was just trying to explain that it's never been like that before. Happening so easily. Feeling it all over. And I remember, Cosmo talked about it. That's all..."

"So this is good? Bad?" he wondered.

"Wonderful. Unexpected."

"Hmmm, like you and me."

She squeezed him a bit tighter to concur.

/

A/N: More to come!


	6. Chapter 6

_**A/N: This chapter picks up on Sunday morning. And covers Monday at work.**_

* * *

><p>She may not have been well rested, but there was no way she could sleep any more, not with the sun coming in the window. Not with half her bed (and more than one's fair share of the covers) taken up by her boss. Still, she smiled at the bear like creature curled next to her.<p>

Lou seemed to have no difficulty with staying asleep despite the late hour. But when he felt her hand pull away from his hip and noticed her weight lift from the bed, he did let up something like a hum to question her intentions. At least that was how she decided to interpret things.

"I'm going to shower. Okay? I'll be back. You sleep," she whispered.

She took the grunt she then received as a 'yes' and smiled harder. It had been a long time since she had had a man to wake up to and there was something ... well, _nice_ in having Lou there.

Twenty minutes later she knew she heard the phone ring. She pinched her robe shut and pulled open the bathroom door. Short, quick steps brought her around the edge of the bed to the table.

The man in her bed groaned.

"Shh," she warned before she finally picked up.

He groaned again, but did so more quietly now.

"Hello!"

There was no hesitancy about her greeting because she knew who it would be. Her parents always called as soon as they got back from church each Sunday.

"No," Mary said in answer to a question Lou could only guess at. "I'm fine. I just was hurrying to get the phone, mom."

Mary turned back to face Lou while she listened to her mother, and she noticed he was sitting up now and pulling on his shirt.

"Don't you dare leave without breakfast," she whispered as she held her hand over the mouthpiece. "Um, Lunch," she amended as she looked at the clock.

He gave her a questioning and almost pitiful look, and she motioned to him quite sternly that he should get back in bed. She laughed to herself as he made a production out of crawling back onto the sheets.

That was when she realized she was behind on the conversation with her mother.

"Sorry. I got distracted." She did an eye roll then that Lou tried not to chuckle over.

There was a pause. Then a squeeze to her towel covered head. "Yes," she said, as if pained. "There is someone here." Another pause and a helpless look at the man stretched out on her rumpled bed, and she answered her mother's obvious question with, "Lou. Um. Grant. You know. Mr. Grant." She sank to the bed then. "Well, he stopped in after a football game in the park near here." She certainly would not mention that that game had been yesterday. That the visit had turned into a sleep over, and that where as his game had been 'touch' only, the night had been quite nearly 'full contact.'

But unfortunately her overactive brain was thinking all those things with frightening clarity.

She had her eyes closed now as if that would keep out the strain she felt.

Suddenly, she could tell Lou had rolled from the bed. She looked up to see him across the room. Smiling unevenly. This worried her a tad.

"Mary!" He called, obviously trying to sound far away. "I'm going to help myself to some coffee. Okay?" He was trying to make the visit sound innocuous or maybe help her end the painful conversation.

"Could I call you back, mom? I should give Mr. Grant a hand with ..."

A slightly panicked looking Mary was listening then.

"I don't know why," she told her mother, dropping her voice. "Yes, I was surprised when he stopped in." A pause. Another uncomfortable look. "Well, it's not _that_ odd. He isn't just my boss. I mean, we are friends, too. You know that."

Once she had hung up and thrown herself into the pillows, Lou came back over to the bed. He petted her, and with a tone of commiseration, he asked, "You can't lie at all, can you?"

"God, not to my parents!" came the muffled reply. "They'd know. They have _always_ known."

"So we're _**friends**_?" he teased as he worked to roll her over. She ended up nearly sideways in the bed, with him leaning over her.

"Sunday morning, over the phone did not seem like the time to launch into ... Well, everything." She paused then. "You know what she said?" she suddenly demanded. "She thinks we are both lonely. And she figures neither one of us will ever meet the right person if we spend all our time together. But that maybe _**that**_ is why we do it. What does that mean?"

"Nothing I want to contemplate. At least not on an empty stomach. Come on," he encouraged, pulling on her hands. "I'll cook."

/ / / / / / / / / /

"I should go, Mary," he said simply, once lunch was over.

She knew he was right. She had things to get done. He probably did, too. Still, she had this strange feeling – like she would miss him even though they would see each other in less than 20 hours.

He had said he was going to leave, and yet they both just continued to stand there. Neither of them seemed ready to make their goodbye happen.

"We're doing that wonderful awkward thing," she teased as she tugged on his shirt shyly.

"Mmmm, but we had fun getting here. You know, I've been here over 24 hours at this point."

"So, I'll see you tomorrow, and we will dance around all this ...until after work?"

"Until after work," he echoed. He kissed her chastely and made himself turn for the door.

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / /

Hours later, Mary had just climbed into bed for the night when the phone rang. "Hey," came Lou's voice over the line.

"Hi!" she replied, sounding happy and surprised.

"I wanted to tell you 'goodnight.'"

"That's sweet," she murmured as she pulled her blankets up around her.

"Don't let that get out, all right?" he joked.

"Right. You're a tyrant. Got it."

"Better," he replied.

"And I love you, Lou. Good night."

"I love you, too. G'night."

/ / / / / / / / / / / / /

At work on Monday, she kept her head down. Even though they had been through this charade for weeks now, seeing Lou in the office seemed more overwhelming on this particular morning.

But then it had been getting steadily more difficult to pretend there was nothing between them even before they had spent the night together.

That first week, after those initial, telling kisses, she had been so stunned about the whole change that it was actually easy to just pretend it wasn't real. She found she could make believe that somehow the man in her boss' office was not the same man who laughed with her over dinner or kissed her at evening's end.

But now, as Lou came into the office and passed behind her, she found herself nervously rearranging all the little things on her desk one more time. She merely called out a distracted sounding 'Good Morning' over her shoulder as he walked behind her rather than meeting his eyes.

Looking at his office door now – his name written there - she remembered a conversation they had had about hiding the relationship when they had only been dating two weeks.

_"It's not just that I think I'm going to slip up," she had told him as she sat at his place, her feet in his lap. "I might want to tell people."_

_"Who?"_

_"At least some people," she had hedged._

_"I'm not saying you can't tell people, but you have to be ready for the fall out, Mary."_

_"Because you're my boss?"_

_He'd been painfully direct then. "Management will call me in. Ask me if it's true. And then ask me which one of us plans on moving."_

_That little dose of reality had cause a long and worrisome silence._

Everything was different now in her scary present tense. There had been intimacies that had killed any chance of reticence. Intimacies that begged more intimacies. Things that made her giddy.

Feelings that made her realize she was staring at the man's door like an idiot...

Lou looked back out the office door just then. And Mary ducked her head after an initial response that was blatantly nervous and guilty.

Still, she was smiling. And smiling over nothing more than that first glimpse she had gotten of him with his jacket already off and his tie pulled ridiculously askew. She was hopeless, she decided, because she thought him adorable like that.

He, too, paused. And swallowed hard just as she was nervously looking away. "Murray," he finally managed. "Bring that construction piece in here, would ya?"

"Right, Lou." And once their boss had popped his head back into the office, the news writer grabbed a file. But before pushing off from his chair, Murray leaned over. "What's gotten in to him?" he whispered. "I can usually count on at least two quiet hours on a Monday morning."

"Something to do with football? Maybe?" Mary wondered before she realized that no reply at all would have been better.

/ / /

The news room was quiet now. She could call the doctor, see about having some prescriptions called in...

Twenty minutes later she was flushed. But she'd done it. She'd managed to arrange the refills she needed while Murray was in with Lou and before anyone else like Ted had come in.

But how would she make it through the work day thinking about tonight?

/ / / / / / /

About an hour later, Lou surprised her by appearing at her desk.

"Let's get some coffee and a couple donuts," he announced.

She only stared back.

"Come on. Really," Lou said almost gruffly. "You look like it's been a rough morning, and I was going to buy you a donut." There was a pause before he tried a different tack. "Okay, I want a donut, and I don't want to eat alone."

"Like some closet donut eater?" Murray suggested. "So rather than kick the habit, you are trying to lure Mary into a life of vice? Shame on you, Lou!" he added, eyes twinkling.

"Something like that, Murray," Lou said looking a tad disturbed. He cleared his throat. "Look, Mary, we can talk about your list of new back ground shots while we do."

"Well, okay," she said, and she grabbed the relevant file from inside her drawer. Ever polite, Mary asked Murray if he wanted something brought back for him. He happily requested a jelly donut... and that he always be included whenever they were going to 'give into vice.'

Mary blanched and froze there as if they had been found out. Lou risked bodily steering her for the exit.

"So, how was your weekend?" Lou asked nonchalantly as they walked out the office doors.

"Oh, you know," she replied, trying to sound bored. "Same old thing."

At the end of the hall they then waited in silence until the elevator dinged open for them. "Same old thing?" he repeated, as if to complain. He narrowed his gaze in mock disbelief. And once he was in the elevator, he told her, "Ouch!" and sank against the compartment wall.

As the doors closed, she hit him with the file rather than face the daunting task of actually forming more words. "Well, what are you doing asking me about my weekend... after we had that... you know... _**weekend**_?"

"Are you mad?"

"More like insane," she insisted.

He nodded. "I've been told I have that effect on women."

And suddenly she was laughing with him. Before she knew it, she was kissing him. Just one serene, uncomplicated kiss the exact length of the ride down to the lobby.

"Come over tonight for dinner?" he said lowly as they faced the doors and waited for them to open. "Pack a tooth brush. Stay for breakfast?"

"On a school night?" she teased without looking at him.

He worried then that he was more eager for them to spend the night together than she was.

"I just..." he began uneasily.

He wasn't moving. So, she stepped forward to hold the now open door. "I have a complete inability to travel light," she whispered as he came along side her. "Can you stay over with me instead?"

"Yeah. Yeah, of course," he said grinning and sounding relieved.

/

_**A/N: Thanks for reading, folks!**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**A/N: I have written this type of scene before. And while these things are tough to write the first time because it is new, it is definitely difficult the fourth or fifth time around because you do not want it to be a simple retread of those earlier stories. **_

_**I've worked on this a bit over the last few days... and after the last read through, I told myself, "Hey, this just might not suck!" Feel free to concur.**_

* * *

><p>Monday after work he arrived at Mary's once he had grabbed a few things from home.<p>

Tonight felt different for them both. And standing in Mary's kitchen together, they found they were reduced to making nervous small talk at first.

"I don't think we dare make a habit of staying the night together too often... not when we both have to be at work in the morning," Lou told her at last.

"But?" she supplied, as she handed him a drink.

He didn't even take a sip before he placed the glass down. "But tonight," he began seriously. "I want to be with you." Mary was a bit surprised then when he looked away in order to get the rest out. "I hope you don't think I'm presumptuous and horribly unromantic when I say this, but... I've been to the drug store. God, just kick me out if I'm making a mess of this."

In his strangely shy, but straight forward way, he was saying he wanted to sleep with her. And telling her he had removed the obstacle of a lack of contraceptive.

"I had hoped to be a bit more romantic about this," he continued. "Something more charming and enticing than, 'Hey! I stocked up. We could make love like rabbits and not run out.'"

Mary laughed and playfully pulled him closer by grabbing his shirt front. She touched his cheek then to make him meet her eyes fully. "Oh, Lou. I went to the pharmacy, too," she said smiling broadly. The idea that they had both armed themselves with condoms struck her as reassuringly funny. "And I had the doctor write me another prescription for... A couple of things. We can skip the details..." Too much honesty could certainly kill whatever mood they were currently blundering across. She reached around him to grip at the wrinkled fabric at the small of his back. And she plied the material free until she could run her hands over the comforting heat of his back.

Lou stood watching her. He was enjoying this, watching her seduce him, registering the rush of feeling she caused in him. He felt like a man apart.

And God, he wanted her.

Once she had kissed him almost cautiously, she whispered, "Dinner can wait."

"_**That **_is the most beautiful euphemism I've ever heard," he told her.

She began to methodically unbutton his shirt. As she made her slow progress, he rested his lips against her forehead. Finally, he finished his pervious thought, "And _**you**_, Mary, are the most beautiful thing I ever wished for."

Even after all the years she had known him, Lou could still amaze her. And tonight, it wasn't just his words, but they way he said them. He made her feel adored and desired. She kissed him and put her mouth to his ear. "You _**are**_ romantic. You are _**marvelous**_."

/ /

She managed to get the bedroom just shy of pitch black. And she took off her dress while he worked on his trousers. He was behind her then, quietly working her straps down, wordlessly opening her clasp. When she tried to speak, he shushed her and guided her to the turned down bed.

"Slowly," he assured her in answer to something he saw in her face. Something that said she wanted it to be perfect.

"Mmm. Yes," she replied.

He teased at her. Kissed and touched her. But it was never quite enough to answer what she was feeling.

"Oh God, Lou. Not **_that_** slowly," she told him, sounding breathless... And a bit bemused.

He laughed, chuckled really. Like a man who was truly amused. And she loved that he had, deep down, that sort of self assurance and sense of humor.

Lou was no longer pressing at her. No longer looming over her. He had rolled to his back next to her, but his fingers were still entwined with hers. He raised her hand to his lips to kiss it sweetly. She heard the breath he took a moment later. Deep, almost shuddering. And his mood - and hers - changed in that instant.

He moved over her again, and she shifted to welcome him tight against her.

"I've never wanted to get anything right more than this," he told her.

"Please. Now," was all she managed.

And somehow, even with all their expectations...

Even after their weekend of unwelcome restraint and the work hours that had felt like frustrated foreplay...

Still, the reality of finally being together like this was wonderfully astonishing for them both.

…

"Do you ever get scared?" she asked him far later.

There was a long pause. And then he gave her a smooth, "Oh, sure. There was that shelling in France. There was the time I let Ted drive..."

She sighed. And he knew.

"_**You're**_ scared, aren't you?" he whispered.

"Of course, I am. What if this goes badly? What if..."

"What if..." he interrupted. "What if it goes _**well**_?"

"What?" Mary protested.

"Are you sure that for you... maybe, just maybe, having things work out wouldn't be almost as frightening to think about?"

"No. That's not it," she insisted. "But … There are all these changes. There's this constant feeling that everything is a risk... "

He wasn't really sure that Mary was being honest about her fears – with herself or with him. But there was nothing to do about it but hold and reassure her. He put both arms around her and drew her closer. "It's not just you, Mary. I've been worried, too. About a million things. I don't want problems for you at work because of me. I don't want to push you. To overwhelm you. Hell, I don't want to _**under**_whelm you. I never want you to resent me."

"And _**you**_ aren't the type to worry," she pointed out.

"Me? I dunno. I worry about things now and then. I get scared." There was a long pause then. "I just haven't _**admitted**_ to anyone that I was scared in the last 25 years."

She put her hand over his heart. Leaned in and kissed his chest.

He pulled her a little tighter. "Oh, Mary. What you do to me."

And she didn't know if he meant the kisses or this new reality where so much was shared. Because there was a frightening amount of sharing now. Not just of the physical, but the emotional.

Mary felt the way his heart was surging.

She moved higher up to kiss at his neck and she slipped her hand to his arm. There was the slightest thought from her, then, a wish. Her fingers may have pulled at him slightly, but more than that, he responded because he just knew. Because, she decided, he knew her.

She moved to her back, and he followed her. He kissed her softly again and again as he lightly pinned her there.

"We could..." she told him as she brushed at his hair.

"Could we?" he asked. And in the dark there the want in him came through in those simple words. And for the second time that night, they were both exactly what the other needed.


	8. Chapter 8

_**A/N: Thanks so much for reading this. I have loved the reviews. I am always thrilled when something I write goes over well. **_

/

Work was like some distracted play they had not rehearsed sufficiently. They were stiff and awkward with each other one minute, and then finishing each other's sentences the next. There was the sense in both of them that this deception couldn't be kept up for too long. But there was a dangerous euphoria, too, this invincible sense that someone only gets from being newly in love.

Mary was getting used to the questioning looks. The requests that she not hum quite so much. She had a repertoire now of lines meant to deflect Murray and Ted's interest in the changes they perceived in her. And truly, THAT was the most alarming thing, that Ted finally noticed something was different with her.

And when he got caught staring at Mary, or lost in thought with nothing more to focus on than the far wall, Lou dealt with the raised eyebrows by being more gruff than ever.

… … …

A week later they lay in bed at his house. Their night out had been wonderful. They had laughed and joked together. Walked along the sidewalks with their arms around each other and kissed in the shadows. Every moment, they had been so effortlessly in synch.

Lou was a man who moved not so much at a steady pace, but by making leaps. And for him, tonight had caused one of those leaps in understanding and then in faith.

He gathered her up in his arms.

It was the silence that spoke volumes. Before he even said a single word, Mary knew something was changed. He was holding her like glass. His breath was rough and audible. She waited nervously as he caressed her face. And finally, the words came.

"I love you," he said with painful intensity. "I want this to work. I want us to be together... Years from now..."

The look in his eyes was so strong. So solid.

And in that moment, he needed to hear from her, but for Mary, the world was held in suspension.

She felt it. It was too real, how much he loved her. There was nowhere to hide. She turned her head bluntly to the side and held her breath.

He could see what it all meant suddenly. "It's like that, is it? Having a relationship succeed really does scare you more than failure? We can have sex, but... we just won't talk about the future?"

"Lou," she tried to protest. But she knew he was right, she was scared. Paralyzed. Stuck living only nows after watching too many dreams get pulled away.

Maybe she couldn't help who she had become, but it wasn't fair to him.

He rolled away, and she waited, primed and listening to hear him leave the room. But he didn't.

Without looking, she reached over in the dark and found his hand. She squeezed and waited. And she was heartened when he squeezed back.

"I'm sorry," she told him, quietly.

Mary pinched at her brow with her free hand, and she thought it through. She thought about those men who had disappointed her, who had been found wanting. The men who had led her to being with Lou.

And she realized she needed this. To be confronted by this man's strength. His wounded honesty. The command he worked over his own fears.

She was so skittish, so broken. Lou was right, success scared her. Admitting she wanted a future frightened her. So, she never did it anymore.

She'd gotten to the point where having a relationship fail. And early. Was just easier on her brittle emotions. And those other men had either been too distant or too weak to demand she invest. Or commit.

Bill had broken that engagement so many years ago. And he was only the beginning.

Lou was surprised to hear her break their silence with her laugh.

"Mary?"

"Do you know how annoying it is to get to be my age and realize your mother is right?"

He moved to face her. And petted at her arm, while she continued. "She told me that I have gotten to the point where I sabotage things with any right man I've been out with. But that I pick the wrong man more often than not - just to save myself that trouble."

"Where does that leaves us?" Lou wondered, his voice low and tired.

"I am going to try so very hard not to sabotage this. I love you." She laughed again. "But, God, you're tough on the status quo."

They were quiet a long time then, both afraid to break the agreeable mood.

"Tell me when you fell in love with me," he beseeched her quietly, a few minutes later.

"I don't know when it happened. Not exactly. I think it was a gradual thing. But I do know when I realized that it had already happened."

"Tell me."

"It was the Saturday you surprised me after your game. It was the way I felt when I saw you. I didn't expect you to be standing there when I opened the door, and I was just ridiculously _**happy **_to see you. I could just feel how hard I was smiling. And then when I saw that you'd gotten hurt..." she paused with the weight of the confession, "I just wanted to wrap you up and take you to bed."

"And I thought I'd scare you off that day," he mused.

She squeezed him then, before she gave him a little shake. "You have to tell me now, you know. When did you fall in love with me?"

"Oh, I knew before that day, but I just didn't trust then that all of this could work. That Saturday, I was thinking about you after my game... Mary, I've been crazy about you... I've thought you were gorgeous for so long it's embarrassing. But that sort of thing. That's just a crush. And after my game, I was leaning against my car, thinking about what a sorry, middle-aged mess I was.

"'I'm in love with her,' I told myself, and I was miserable because I didn't see how it would last if we weren't realistic about who we were. Especially, if you couldn't stand me being a disappointment from time to time. I got myself into my car after that game, and I looked at my watch thinking I had 6 hours to get myself together. Get cleaned up. Rest up. Watch some football and then find a suit to wear for our date. Six hours to somehow become the kind of man I thought you preferred. And the next thing I know I'm knocking on your door, hours early."

"I'm glad you did. I'm glad I could show you - I love you the way you are."

/

It had been a week since they had discussed Mary's fear of the future.

They were were wrapped around each other in her bed. The hold she had on him, he had decided it meant something. Her arms were tensely drawn around him despite her being asleep.

"Mary," he tried as he stroked down her side. He kissed her forehead and whispered then, "Shhh. Easy, it's alright."

"What's wrong?" she asked as she began to wake up.

"You tell me."

She had held him like this on other nights. He wasn't sure if he understood it. He was afraid to guess. But it seemed that as much as her waking mind struggled with the idea of a future, her subconscious was afraid he would leave.

When she declined to talk, he kissed her. Kissed her and pulled her hard to him, the way that she had held on to him. And she responded, returned the tugs and embraces that spoke for the desperation in them both.

"I'm not going anywhere," Lou told her. "Not tomorrow. And not next week."

"It all makes me a little crazy sometimes."

"Worrying... about us?"

"And wondering," she sighed.

"We can make this work. But we need to do more than _**hope**_ it works," he told her. And to him that meant things would need to change, maybe get a little shook up, before they settled into that future he was hoping he could pull off.

/


	9. Chapter 9

_**A/N: I had fun with this. Let it get a little away from me. Hope you enjoy.**_

* * *

><p><em>"We can make this work. But we need to do more than <strong>hope<strong> it works," he told her. And to him that meant things would need to change, maybe get a little shook up before they settled into that future he was hoping he could pull off._

Mary didn't think he meant anything specific about 'doing more.' But 24 hours would change an awful lot in their relationship.

/

The next morning was Sunday, and Lou needed to clear off from Mary's. He knew her parents were coming by to take her to brunch. But something kept him lingering there.

The doorbell rang as the pair worked on the last of their coffee.

"Tell me that isn't them. They're 45 minutes early!" Mary said sounding more dismayed than panicked.

Looking sadly resigned, Mary pulled open the door. And then she immediately shrunk an inch at the sight of her mother standing there. There were the distracted 'hellos,' a kiss on the cheek, and then her mother's clipped sounding, "Your father's in the car." This she said while coolly eying Mary's visitor.

Lou wasn't sure what had brought the older woman there early that morning. Suspicion. Concern. Or just the world's shortest church sermon. It didn't matter. Given last night's realization that the relationship needed to change and maybe even get a bit shook up, he was glad to see Mrs. Richards. This would save him a phone call.

"Mr. Grant," the woman said, carefully.

"Please," he answered amiably. "Call me Lou."

"I'm surprised to see you here," Mrs. Richards told him flatly.

"Mom!" Mary complained.

"You shouldn't be surprised," Lou replied, unbothered by Dottie's honesty. Mary's head spun to confront Lou now. But he seemed unfazed by the warning look. "Mary makes great coffee," he continued, hoisting his cup. "And well... I think the world of her. I hope you know that." He paused then for emphasis. "But I should be going. You have that brunch to get to. Lots to talk about." He laid a hand on Mary's arm as he handed her his mug. And if that didn't shock the two women enough, he then kissed Mary on the cheek. "I'll call you later, Mar."

He headed for the still open door without waiting for a reply.

And it would have been a brilliant exit. And it certainly could not come soon enough for Mary, but there was one problem.

"Lou," Mary said, sounding obviously pained.

"Hmmm?" he answered, pulling up short and reluctantly turning around.

"Your coat," she whispered urgently. Head down, she pointed to where it lay. On the chair that was, unfortunately, sitting closest to her bedroom.

/ / / / /

"Did you tell your mom about us?" he asked, as he watched her brush her teeth that night. She rolled her eyes at him in the mirror and then spat into the sink.

"I didn't have to," Mary accused. She turned to poke him lightly in the chest. "You did that."

"You could have denied I meant anything by it all."

"Maybe I'm sick of denying everything," she conceded, as she finished up in the bathroom.

"Good. I think I'd like it if you were."

He leaned in and kissed her neck while she smiled at him vaguely. She watched him walk for the bedroom before she called out, "Oh, and who have you come clean with then?"

He didn't answer until they had both crawled into the bed. He rolled to look at her, seeming sad that she doubted him. "I told my daughters," he told her softly. "But they know we are keeping things quiet for now. And I told Mike."

"You told Mike?" she echoed, as she pulled the covers around them both.

"I'm glad I did," he said, sounding surprised at the difference it made. "Not that I tell him any details. Just 'Mary and I had a great time out' or if he asks me if I've seen a movie, I can at least say who I saw it with. I mean, what's the point in feeling like the luckiest bastard around if I can't even tell anyone?" He paused and she kissed his cheek to acknowledge the compliment. "I know you like having Rhoda to talk to."

"I do," Mary admitted. "And I tell her how lucky I feel, too." She prodded him in the belly then, teasingly. "And, of course, I can talk to my mom and dad about _**us**_ now, too," she said sarcastically.

/ / / / / / / / / /

It went without saying, given their propensity for teasing each other, that Mary would indulge in some good-natured getting even. By Monday, Mary didn't really resent Lou for having 'outted' them to her parents. The initial firestorm had died down, quelled by Mary's assertion that she loved Lou and that he was the sweetest man she knew (even if his socks mysteriously multiplied by the edge of the bed - a fact she left unspoken).

Lou hustled out of her apartment early on Monday morning to make a meeting with the station manager. This left Mary to plan her revenge while standing in front of her closet.

Once to the office, Mary's choice of punishment for Lou was drawing lots of attention. She stood by the coffee, arresting traffic in a set of daunting heels and a form fitting dress.

"Lunch date?" Murray wondered, swallowing hard.

Ted laughed nervously and nearly choked, lost in his own questionable thoughts.

When Lou came through the door a minute later, he looked, he processed what he saw, but he forced himself to continue walking for his desk... a task that was made difficult by his eyes' refusal to look at anything but the long line of her legs.

Lou made it to his office and pushed the door shut rather hard. A groan rose up from behind his walls, and Mary had to smile at the ease of her victory.

Murray chose to interpret things differently. "That's our Lou. Monday morning and he is decidedly hung over."

"Poor guy," Mary managed, sounding less than sympathetic. "Maybe I should check on him. See if I can get him something."

But she didn't need to approach him. Lou pulled the door open just then and leaned out. His coat was off and his shirt sleeves were already roughly pushed to his elbows. Mary tried to hide her grin behind her coffee cup.

"You okay this morning?" Murray asked.

"Fine," Lou growled. He looked to Mary then and froze before he barked out, "Budget, Mary. Now."

Two minutes later she was neatly arranged in his guest chair and holding the necessary file. He closed the door and slid into his own chair, before he shook his head at her.

"_**Those**_ heels, Mary?" he said with an appreciative look at her footwear... And calves.

"Hmmm?"

"Are you mad at me?" he joked. A wicked smile creased his face.

She spared him a quick look before pretending to be absorbed in the budget numbers. "I'm just keeping you on your toes," she kidded.

He groaned at the pun. He put his head in his hands then and scrubbed at his face.

They'd been careful. By unspoken agreement they tried not to touch each other at work. They rarely let their conversations turn personal. And they certainly never let themselves tease and flirt with each other ... the way they were now.

"How about I take you … and your shoes... out for dinner?"

"School night," she warned. She dropped her head and tapped her pencil on the rows of figures before dragging the eraser over her lips seductively. "Hmmm, we have a surplus under Travel this quarter..."

"Please, Mary. After the first look I got of you this morning, I was fairly certain I was calling in sick tomorrow."

"We can't go out. You have a 'boys' night out' with Mike tonight. Don't you remember?"

"Mary, as of 10 minutes ago, I forgot my own middle name."

"Allen," she replied, feigning distraction.

"Are you getting even with me?"

She sighed and leaned back in her chair, becoming more her usual self. "Maybe I'm softening the blow. My mother wants the two of us to come over for dinner on Saturday."

"Absolutely no problem with dinner on Saturday," he said. "Just don't dress like that. Now, please, get outta here before I decide I want an early lunch... and that you are on the menu."

Mary returned to her desk where she laughed to herself while she changed into more sensible shoes and added a blazer.

/ / / /


	10. Chapter 10

_A/N: I am rushing to post this before I lose power. It has flickered twice already. I love snow!_

/ / / /

Lou was able to turn that evening's 'boys' night out' into a double date. Mike's girlfriend, Anne, recommended the restaurant, and Lou readily concurred. "There's a great patio," he said. But it was too late in the season to eat outdoors at night and the sky was threatening rain.

Dinner was lovely and it felt wonderful to be a couple in the company of others. They couldn't linger though, as it was a Monday. Anne needed to get up early the next day. For her, the joke that it was a school night was all too true. "I need to get her home," Mike said, smiling. "It takes lots of sleep to face 25 eleven year olds at 8 am."

Good byes were quick on the sidewalk as a drizzle began to fall. Lou held Mary's hand and stood fast, resisting the tug that she had hoped would steer him to the car.

"Lou?" she questioned.

"C'm'ere," he whispered. He drew her back towards the building, and they rounded the brick wall then. "It really is a great patio."

"Could it be a 'great patio' that we visit some other time?"

He laughed and walked her between the rows of fake topiary.

"The patio is closed," she complained, as she thumped the sign he was pushing her past.

"I love that whole rule following thing you have. It makes it seem even more exciting then when I get you to do something."

"Just what did you have in mind?" she asked, warily.

"Just this."

He led her by the hand as the rain fell harder on them. He skipped the cover of the canopies to purposely stand in the wet darkness beyond. Slowly then, in between teasing kisses, he opened her raincoat and insinuated himself into its warmth. The feel of his hands, cool and damp through her blouse, sent the most pleasant chills through her. "Oh God," she whispered.

He kissed her deeply then, and it was wonderful. The feel and taste of the water on their lips made it all the more sensual.

"We're drenched," she told him, but she wasn't complaining now.

"You'll need warming up when we get back to my place," he whispered. "You'll need …. someone to get you out of these wet clothes. Someone to make sure you are very, very warm."

He was taken off guard when she leaned in to answer him without words. She tongued across his lips to catch the raindrops there. She kissed him hard then as her hands fisted in his jacket and pulled him in tighter – all of this was new, Lou thought. Not something she had ever done before in a potentially public place.

… …

She rested her hand on his thigh as they drove home. He cranked the heat and looked at her apologetically when she let out of shiver. "God, I'm sorry, Mary. I don't know why I thought that was a good idea."

"It was a lovely idea. But it would have been lovelier in July. And, you know, I wasn't cold at the time."

"No, me neither," he said with a strange little smile. He wiped more water out of his eyes. "You aren't mad at me?"

"For having a romantic fantasy? For wanting to kiss me in the rain. No!" she insisted. SHe paused then before making her confession. "I think about things like that."

He hustled her in his front door as soon as they arrived. They were smiling then as they pulled off each other's clothes. They stood by the bed getting dried off, using up all the clean towels in the process.

"What kind of things do you think about then?" he wanted to know, sounding almost uneasy. "You know, when you think about things, like kissing in the rain."

She smiled and kissed him. Led him to the bed. "I think my imagination is pretty pedestrian," she told him as she burrowed in close to him under the covers. "I day dream about the usual things. Candle light and fireplaces. Or a quiet cabin somewhere. Maybe..."

She trailed off as if embarrassed.

"Come on. Maybe what?" he prompted softly.

"Um, maybe a sleeper car on the train."

"Well, I've got candles in the kitchen," he told her. He kissed her deeply then with a pleasant slowness. It was all very seductive. And she thought she knew exactly where they were headed until a wicked grin crept across his face. "And if we shake the bed, we can pretend we are on a train."

She laughed. "I love you like this."

"Naked?"

Mary smiled harder then. "I had meant romantic. Funny. And mine. But yeah, naked, too."

/

Come Friday, they were planning on a quiet night at his place after work. Mary was all set to go, and she was just waiting for Lou. She leaned against the desk in his office while he checked his inbox one more time.

Everyone else was gone for the night, and half the office lights were already off. Mary sighed as she considered how they'd somehow ended up the last ones there.

"You can go on ahead without me," he offered.

"Uhn uh, Mister. I'm not risking you getting distracted here. We'll leave for your place at the same time."

He groaned then as he found something in the bottom of the pile he was pawing through. "Okay. Okay, two minutes. Five tops. I just need to leave this in the film room," he said shaking a canister at her. She waved him off dramatically, and he turned and walked out.

She got bored waiting for him, but found she couldn't sit still. Then, staring at his coat rack, she began to feel a bit impish. He hadn't worn the old hat in a year. Even he had begun to realize the thing was out of date. She smiled as she reached for it and then pulled it onto her head. She was giggling as the brim slid down to the bridge of her nose. It all made her realize how happy and settled she felt now with Lou. More than anything, she felt... comfortable. A dozen old dance moves came to her as she pushed the hat higher. She was that happy, she guessed.

His coat came off the rack then, and she pushed her arms through the sleeves. She spun once and pulled the coat tightly around her. It just felt good. Smelled good. She flipped the collar up around her face and collapsed into his chair. She didn't care that the hat fell down over her eyes again as she kicked her feet up on the desk. She just closed her eyes and started to hum. Soon she was singing.

"Mary?" came the man's strangled sounding query.

It wasn't Lou. But she knew who it was.


	11. Chapter 11

_**A/N: I have been working on this idiot chapter forever. It was not as easy to plow through as the others. It needed a deft, sensible approach. Or at least an author who could put things in a logical order. I found her eventually.**_

_His coat came off the rack then, and she pushed her arms through the sleeves. She spun once and pulled the coat tightly around her. It just felt good. Smelled good. She flipped the collar up around her face and collapsed into his chair. The hat came down over her eyes again as she kicked her feet up on the desk. She started to hum._

_"Mary?" It wasn't Lou's voice. But she knew who it was._

"Ohhhhh!" she lamented. She swung her feet to the floor as she pulled off the hat. Sheepishly, she greeted the news writer and his wife. "Murray! Marie! I thought you folks had headed to dinner. "

"Murray forgot that package he had delivered to the office," Marie offered. "And... we thought we heard singing."

Murray had yet to manage any words.

...

"Murray knows," Mary said, her voice firm and unhappy. She curled against Lou's back in his bed with a sort of resignation.

"Just because you were sitting in my office? How could he know?" Lou countered.

"Oh, even if he doesn't, Marie does."

"How can you know that she knows? And just what are we saying she knows," Lou asked as he twisted to face her.

"There are things you don't do..." Mary tried to explain. "You don't just sit around dressed in a man's coat and hat. You don't sing Marlene Dietrich songs with your feet up on your boss' desk. And you don't blush quite as badly as I did... Unless."

"Unless?"

"Unless you are sleeping with that someone."

"You are sure these are universal rules? I've never heard these."

"Believe me, Marie knows," she stressed. "Murray is confused, but he'll figure it out Monday."

"Monday?"

"Eight hours, sitting 4 feet away from him? I'll crack by lunch. By the third time he looks over at me with the question bursting in him, I'll just blurt it out. 'True! Its' all true!' I'll end up yelling. 'I'm sleeping with Lou! And _**that's**_ why he buys me donuts.'"

"So, what are you thinking?" Lou said, suddenly sounding more serious.

"I don't know."

"That was not your 'I don't know voice.'" He was certain that at the very least Mary was not looking forward to everyone finding out about them. There would be all those sticky, necessary explanations. She knew that people would look at her differently. "If you regret getting involved, I want you to tell me," Lou continued. "If our being together suddenly seems like it isn't worth going public with or complicating our lives over... then you have to let me know. I get that it's going to be different now. What we had was easy. It was just us. It was on our terms..."

"And nothing stays easy does it?" She agreed, giving him a quick squeeze.

"No. And I don't think it is helping your mood tonight that we have to be a couple in front of your parents tomorrow," Lou said sympathetically.

"That isn't going to be my idea of a great night out, but it will likely stop shy of the Spanish Inquisition." She grabbed his arm and squeezed. "And even with all of that, I absolutely do not regret 'us.' "

"You say that now. But don't doubt that things are going to get uncomfortable at work in the short term. We have to fix the work end of this, Mary," he said cautiously. "Otherwise after uncomfortable might come unemployed."

"You mean, I need to not work for you any more."

"Yes."

"Oh, God, Lou. I hate change," she grumbled as she rolled away.

"The only other choice is that we stop seeing each other." he said with a remarkable levelness to his voice. "It isn't as if this should come as a surprise. Actually, we are lucky we have the weekend to talk options."

_We should have talked this through before_, Lou was thinking. But the relationship had felt like a fairy tale from day one, and he hadn't wanted to rush incredibly good things to a bad end.

"You don't really want to break up?" Mary assessed.

He sighed. "You know that's not what I want, Mary. But I have no right to assume that you are going to chose us over your job... " He reached for her and she stiffened under his touch.

"Just because I love you doesn't means I am looking forward to this transition. I guess I'm just petty, Lou," she said with a smile finally creeping into her voice. "Things were good. Wonderful. Easy. And I didn't need to answer any questions. I didn't need to share you. And now, I'm, well... peeved!"

"That's my girl," he whispered in a sultry tone at her ear. He brushed her hair back and sighed then. "I am old enough to know that being in love doesn't magically make things work. Hell, we both know that." He stopped then and swallowed hard. Because what he was saying worried him. Because he knew it was entirely possible, that although Mary was the younger of the two of them, she had been put through the wringer more often.

And that might mean that she had seen things turn out badly just often enough that she had lost her ability to fight for what she wanted.

"But I want things with you to work," Lou reminded her. "And getting you out of the office doesn't mean you have to leave the station. I can get the station manager to put you on some project. The telethon or some documentary thing until something permanent and suitable opens up."

She groaned seeming agitated. "I love you. And I want to chose us over the status quo, as scary as that is. But if you think I'll produce Chuckles the Clown or The Happy Homemaker..."

"Temporary, Mary. Please. Shhh. Look, I'm doing this wrong. I don't want to scare you. But I am not going to gloss over this - because you are important to me. Mary," he implored. "I will not have people saying I give you preferential treatment. Or saying you sleep with me to get ahead. And... I don't want you getting let go over this."

She nodded and pulled in closer to him as she sensed how serious things had become.

"You move out of the office," he continued. "Just temporarily until I can wrangle something. Something for me."

"Something for you? Where would you go?"

"I'd have to leave the station," he said matter-of-factly.

"You'd do that?" she pushed back to scrutinize him. "You'd find something else, so that I could come back to work in the news room eventually?"

"Yes," he told her simply.

She shook her head slowly while she continued to look at him. She thought she would see some lack of commitment there. But there was none. "I can't let you," she said at last. "You've spent years..."

He squeezed her hard, but playfully. "I swear, the closer we get, the less you listen to me," he kidded. He got quieter then as he told her, "For a while now, knowing I would see you after work has been more important than work."

She nodded. "For me, too."

"We've got a good thing. I had worried being together would mean, well... Losing our old selves. Or giving up too much. But you have no problem with me playing cards. I don't mind you going off to your book groups."

"Where are you going with this, Lou?" she said, cautiously.

"I don't just love you, Mary. I like 'us'. And the point is, I do not want work to mess 'us' up. But I can't let our relationship hurt _you_, either."

"Oh, Lou," she said, as she reached to touch his face. She didn't know what he would say next, just that this simple, unassuming man could easily break her heart.

"I don't want some idea that you are fooling around with the boss to affect your career. Or change how people look at you." He sighed. "In fact, if you wanted to walk into the office on Monday and tell everyone that we are getting married, _**nothing**_ could make me happier. Is that hopelessly old fashioned of me, Mary, to think that you won't want people to think we are just sleeping together?"

"I'd rather people didn't have any reason to discuss my sex life at all... but that isn't a reason to get married."

"You know that's not why I want to get married." And he knew he shouldn't have brought it up. He had made his wishes clear, although unspoken, the night he had told her he wanted them to be together years from then. And she had shown him she wasn't ready. "It was a lousy way to propose, and I'm sorry, Mary. But it doesn't make it any less sincere. I've wanted..."

"I know..." she said gently. "You know I love you... and it was a beautiful proposal. Because no one has ever loved me the way you do." But how could she explain that she didn't want marriage to be the solution to a problem? She wanted it, if she wanted it at all, to be something she did with absolute surety. And she doubted she could ever look at anything in her life with absolute surety again. "We need to table this discussion though."

/

At the Richards' house on Saturday, Mary and her mother worked in the kitchen while Walter and Lou stepped onto the patio with their drinks. It was cold to be outside, and so it was obvious that the older man wanted to cover a few points without the women involved.

"I'm supposed to give you the third degree," Dr. Richards acknowledged as he pulled the slider shut.

"I understand," Lou told him with a gracious nod.

"So, I think I'm expected to ask you where things stand between you two."

"Things are good. Very good." It wasn't exactly a lie, Lou told himself. It was just a description of how things had felt before Mary had started to unravel a bit over the prospect of their jobs changing and their relationship becoming office gossip. "She's everything to me right now."

"So... you'd like this to be permanent?"

He wouldn't admit to having proposed and being turned down. But he could give the man an idea of how things stood. "Well, I asked Mary if she could see us in a house together ... And she did allow that she could picture us in a car together," Lou joked.

Mary's father laughed. "She's tough."

"She's worth it." And feeling a bit uncomfortable with revealing the sentiment, suddenly, Lou hid behind his drink.

"How long have you known her? Six years?"

"Seven."

"And the dating?" Walter asked next, an easy rhythm established.

"About three months."

Walter nodded before he said. "You were married."

"Yes. I have three kids. I've got grand kids even."

Walter raised his glass to him in a silent salute. And when he began again, he was more subdued. "Her mother thinks she's changed over the years. Thinks she's... well, jaded."

Lou shook his head just slightly, not wanting to publicly disagree, but unconsciously doing just that.

Dr. Richards caught him at it and smiled. "I don't agree either."

"She doubts things," Lou ventured carefully. "Even when things go well. And experience makes a person cautious... even someone as amazing as Mary."

Walter almost whispered his words then. "Dottie can't see it. Not yet. But it has to be someone she trusts. Absolutely trusts not to hurt her. And that sort of thing is rare. Takes years."

"Walter?" Lou replied.

"Hmm?"

"I'm gonna try damn hard not to screw this up. I promise you."

… …

He walked her to her building without more than 10 words said between them. And it should have frightened Lou. He knew it should. But he wasn't about to let things get away from him now.

Inside her apartment, she lingered near the closed door, seeming not even sure that she wanted Lou to spend the night. "I'm not very good company," she complained.

"Your mother gave you a bucket of grief over me."

She started to wave her hand as if she would deny it. But then she just gave in. "Yes. But not because it's you. Because I'm sleeping with the boss. Because I'm in yet another sexual relationship that I failed to hide from her. She just does better when she is in denial over either my marital status or the status of my virginity," Mary explained. "Which means I'm happier if she is in denial."

"And you're worried about these decisions. Everything with work," he whispered as he stepped closer.

"I make lousy decisions. The mistakes I have made in my life are ..."

"I'm not worried," Lou told her resolutely. He reached up to cup her face gently. "The way I look at it, _**every**_ decision you have ever made, led you here. To WJM. To me."

As Mary looked at him, and that confident smile that she suspected he was faking, she realized something incredible. She realized what was important. It wasn't about dinner tonight or even the discussions from the previous night. It was about setting her sights on tomorrow and next week. The future.

Mary Richards needed to picture that kiss coming at New Years and the New Years after. And it was about knowing absolutely who she wanted her arms around in those moments. Knowing whose future, if anyone's, she wanted to share.

Lou held her hands in his. Entwined their fingers. "Do you understand, Mary?" He kissed her so softly, with what seemed like hesitation. But it was simple, unfiltered emotion. "I love you so very, very much."

"I love you, too," she told him. Her head was heavy at his shoulder now, and she had begun to sink against him. Seeming spent and needing his arms around her.

She wasn't the only one who needed reassurance as they stood there. "Do you trust me, Mary?" Lou found himself saying, as he thought about his conversation with her father. "Really trust that I would never hurt..."

"I trust you. I do."

They clung to each other by the door as if just that lost.

"Will you tell me to stay?" he whispered finally. Any other night it would have been expected that they would simply walk to the bed room together. Tonight he needed her to make the conscious choice. To tell him she wanted him there.

"I want you to stay. Very much."

"And you'll let a desperate old man make love to you?"

"Lou," she said sounding hurt. "Don't say those things. Please." She raised a hand to trace his worn expression. "You... I want _you_ to make love to me. I need you. So you'll remind me how much I love you."

/ / / / / /


	12. Chapter 12

/ / / / / /

Monday morning, Mary decided she would tackle things head on. There was no point in acting as if she didn't know what was on Murray's mind.

"So, Mary. What was all of that on Friday?" the news writer asked cautiously.

"THAT was an excellent excuse for me to take you for a donut and some coffee," she said with a smile that, while not forced, was, at least, planned.

Murray nodded, but looked confused. "Is Lou in?" The man looked guilty for asking what would have been a perfectly ordinary question before Friday night.

"He is, but he has a meeting upstairs." Mary tapped her pencil on the desk and looked at the clock. Lou had been upstairs discussing a new assignment for her with the station manager for longer than she would have liked.

It would be twenty minutes later before Lou pushed roughly through the doors.

Their boss conferred quickly with Murray on the schedule for the day, and then asked Mary to come to his office.

…

"So?" Mary asked hopefully, as she plunked into his guest chair.

"So," he said, looking quite bleak. "There is actually a great opportunity for you. The morning news show is looking at a major change. Adding an extra hour of programming. Mixing news with other features. It really is a super job for you. If you want it."

She thought about it. The need for the station to move to a more modern format was really long over due.

New ground was often the most fun to tackle. And, this was an actual news position that she was being offered, not something with Sue Ann or Chuckles. She was smiling now. Nodding to herself, contently.

"Lou, this sounds like a good fit," she said with relief.

"It is. It really is."

Right about then she realized she was the only passably happy person in the room. _So, why was Lou looking at her like that. _

She stood and walked to the side of the desk to be nearer to him. " And you look so depressed because...?"

"Well, I'm going to miss you," he said, as he stood to step closer.

"We'll still see each other! There's still lunches and evenings and weekends..."

"It's going to be harder than you think, Mary." She wasn't seeing it yet. The two of them had always worked the same schedule. But Lou knew what it was like to have your schedule at odds with someone else's. There had been times when the girls were growing up, and he was working late – times when he'd felt completely disconnected from his family.

He wanted to put his arms around Mary. To kiss her. But he wouldn't. Not here.

"I know. I know," he continued. "We'll still see each other. And we'll make it work. But... Mary, you'll be coming in at 5 AM." He waited for the effect of that to hit her.

She moved back to the chair and sank into it.

"5 AM..."

"You'll get used to it," Lou assured her. But he didn't sound convinced.

"I'll have to be in bed by... Nine!"

/ / / / /

Mary sat primly across from Murray in the building's cafeteria. She always sat like this when she was nervous. It wasn't something she would ever be cured of, she supposed. She was starting to tense up completely. She'd have to just launch into something.

"I'm moving to the morning show, Murray. In a week."

"What? Why?"

"It's a good move, really," a conflicted sounding Mary tried.

"Is it more money?"

"No. And there's really more to it."

"Does this have anything to do with Friday?" Murray asked, seeming confused. "I thought there was something, you know, about Friday that you were going to talk about."

"It's all tied together. I can't stay with the six o'clock news. I can't stay and... see Mr. Grant. You know," she said with a nervous wave of her hand. "See Lou."

"See Lou?"

"Seeing. Dating. You understand..." She was pleading with him comprehend what she meant without too much more explanation.

He nodded finally, but his expression showed that he was really still blindsided. "That's what Marie told me. That you two must be um, together... outside the office. But I didn't believe her," Murray said. The poor man's voice was rising, and he sounded out of breath.

"What did you think was going on? On Friday." Mary asked him.

"God, I thought you'd been drinking or had sort of …. _snapped!_"

Apparently, the idea that Lou and Mary viewed each other with romantic interest was less plausible than Mary having a nervous break down. But then Mary had known this 'coming out' was going to go badly.

Tuesday would be worse.

/ / / / /

Tuesday afternoon, Mary breezed through the office with a fake smile on her face and a destination in mind.

"I bumped into Sue Ann today after lunch," Mary told Lou with feigned bravado, as she leaned into his office.

"Oh, yeah. What does she have to say?"

Mary stepped further in and closed the door behind her. "She said, we consummate this... and I die," Mary squeaked.

"So, I'm guessing _**some**_ news about us has made it to her floor."

"Do you think? Maybe?" Mary dead panned, as she took a swipe at his arm. "What happens when she figures out... well, _all_ of this. You know. All of it. Like the part where I know what you like for breakfast and you know which side of the bed I sleep on."

"I wouldn't worry." Lou looked more amused than Mary thought was warranted.

"I dunno. Nobody owns as many knives as that woman."

Lou decided to change the subject to something equally worrying. "Murray wants to see me after work," he told her.

"I thought you two had lunch together."

"We did," Lou sighed. "Apparently an hour was not enough time for him to explain just how wrong you and I are for each other."

Mary groaned. "Is anyone on our side?"

"Oh, I dunno if anyone is on _**your**_ side, but I did hear one of the interns say, 'The old guy scored.'"

"And you figure he meant you... and with me?" Mary said, sounding a mixture of unhappy and disgusted.

"Oh, yeah."

"Oh, God."

Lou decided a little back peddling was in order. "I'm sure that fellow just meant that by getting you to go out with me, I have 'scored.' Really, Mary. Don't get paranoid thinking everyone knows our bedroom habits. Or that we even have well, joint bedroom habits."

"Right. Right. I'll be fine," she said with effort.

"Does this mean I stand a better chance of... you know..." he wiggled his eyebrows for effect. "... scoring later?"

She growled at him in an decidedly unfriendly manner and left his office.

/ / / / /

When it got to be 8:30 that night, and Lou was still not to her place, Mary decided it was time to crash Murray's little pow wow. She found she was not the only woman to come to the tavern hoping to put an end to things.

"Why didn't you just walk out, Lou?" Marie wanted to know. Mary walked up behind Murray's wife to let out a sigh that was in complete agreement.

But Lou addressed Murray then instead of Marie as he answered that question. "What you think matters to me, Murray."

"But no matter what you think, Murray, it's late, and I'm taking him home," Mary said. She wasn't mad. She looked more tired than anything else.

"Murray. Say 'goodnight,'" Marie told him with wifely exasperation.

Mary took ahold of Lou's hand then, and the man rose to stand with her. "We will see you in 12 hours, Murray. All right?" Mary asked.

"I just do what she says, Murray." Lou quipped. "It's easier that way."

"Ha," Mary told Lou with a smile. "No one believes you."

Lou was standing now with his arm around Mary, so that his hand rested at her hip. It was an intimate, comfortable gesture. He was silent, just smiling at Mary while Murray looked on.

There seemed to be a whole conversation that played between the unlikely pair, although the news writer heard none of it.

"Come on," Mary said finally, as she playfully tugged at Lou's lapel.

"I give up," Murray loudly announced as he held up his hands in surrender. "I'm a believer."

"You see? _**That's**_ why I stayed. I wanted you to see things my way," Lou explained, his grin lighting up his face.

Marie and Mary groaned and dragged their respective men from the place.

/


	13. Chapter 13

_A/N: This is it! The final installment of my first MTM fic. Being the oddball that I am, I finished my second one BEFORE this one. I send out heaps of warm thank yous to all of you for your reviews and support. _

/ / / / /

Her place was dark, and Lou was afraid Mary might already be asleep. It had only been a week since she had started the new job, and he knew she wasn't used to the new schedule yet. He pushed quietly into the bedroom, and then started to smile when she rolled toward him.

"Hey, you're home," she said with a yawn.

_Home._ He liked that sentiment, even if Mary had likely made it unthinkingly. He was smiling even more now.

"We should just have _**one**_ of these 'homes,'" he told her, as he pulled off his tie and sat beside her on the bed. "One of these days, we'll get our wires crossed, I'll go to the wrong place, and we are going to spend the night apart."

"Like we would notice? We are barely together. And one or the other of us is always asleep," she complained groggily.

"Stop. _**I'd**_ notice, Mary."

He slid in next to her and nuzzled at her neck. "Okay," she told him. "I'd notice, too. You know, I love you."

"Um. Hmmm."

"And," she said, as she wiggled away a little so she could look at him. "You make all of this so much easier."

"Good. And you like the new job?"

"I do. But... "

"The schedules?" Lou said, knowingly.

"Yes. I hate..."

"Don't," he cut in. "Don't worry about what you can't fix, hon. It'll get better. And since I got home late, I'll get up with you in the morning. Okay?"

"That's sweet."

He started to kiss at her neck again. "I can't help it," he told her.

/ / / / / /

Things continued on that way. They saw each other less, but there was still time together. And the time together, Mary had to admit, was wonderful.

They managed the holidays, something Mary would have wondered about before. With the new job, however, life was more about just doing - there wasn't the time to worry. So, Christmas was a nervous, tired sort of jumble with trips to see his daughters and her parents.

But it was good, she realized. "See? You survived," Lou teased, after a New Year's Day dinner over at her folks' house. He handed her some cocoa and snugged in next to her on the couch.

This dear man made everything better without seeming to try. He had managed to say all the right things to her mom. And from the moment they had walked into the get together at Lou's youngest daughter's house, the darling man had made it obvious to everyone, in a lovely and subtle way, that Mary should be considered something permanent in his life.

She put her mug down and turned to him. "I love you," she told him. There was something different in her voice as she said it. Even she heard it.

"I love you, too," Lou whispered back.

"No. I mean I really, really love you. Sort of ...overwhelmingly."

"I know exactly how you feel," he smiled.

He kissed her then, and she thought about a long ago question she had asked herself. A question about kisses on New Year's Eve. She knew the answer. He had been the one there on this past New Year's Eve. What she knew now was, there was no one else she could picture herself with when the time came to start another new year and share that kiss.

/

More months went by with a grudging sort of ease to them. They had their routines. Mary still had her gripes. But she had Lou.

One spring morning they met by the elevator on his floor so they could have lunch together. Given their competing schedules, it meant it was a late lunch for her and a ridiculously early one for him. It was just nods and smiles while they waited for the door to ding open. And then they moved in to stand off to the side.

"Lobby? Right?" he asked needlessly as he pressed the button.

"Kiss me?" she whispered in reply from behind him. Her hand slipped to his back underneath his suit coat.

Lou let up a quiet, amused little noise. "I am starting to think you believe this sort of behavior is required in elevators." He turned to pull her in and tease her then, kissing her only on the neck.

She whined in complaint and caught him by the lapels; Mary took her kisses then, finishing as the elevator came to a stop. They had these rides down to a very, very enjoyable art.

As soon as they were seated for lunch, he launched into conversation. "Now that you've been on the early show about six months, Mary, what would you say to going back to the six o'clock news?" He had that lilt to him. That, I-know-something-I'm-not-telling-you lilt.

"What are we really talking about?"

"Well... there's a job at the Tribune, and if I get that, you would be a shoe in for my position at WJM." His grin was slow and full then, when it came.

/ / /

Lou was thrilled when he got the newspaper job. Not only was he was he looking forward to working in print again, but he just knew this move was the start of things settling between him and Mary. When Mary applied for Lou's old job at WJM, she landed it without any hassle.

Their hours still would not be exactly the same, but things would be much closer to normal. They wouldn't be in the same building anymore, but it was the best fit. A happy one. One that seemed focused on the future.

They decided to celebrate by taking a vacation together before beginning their new jobs. Mary insisted Lou be the one to make the travel arrangements for their time away. She didn't trust her luck. "Something simple," she told him. "It doesn't need to be far away. Nothing exotic. Just as long as we are alone and together."

What Lou decided on, was a cabin in the northern part of the state. In his mind, at least, it was a place that spoke to the fantasies he remembered her mentioning. 'Candle light and fireplaces. A quiet cabin somewhere.'

Mary worried as their car approached the place, but she bit her lip rather than say anything. The state of the gravel road was a bit troubling. As was the little wooden bridge that took them over a stream. Then she saw the cabins that were spread out, tucked into the wood line. Civilization was seemingly gone, she thought. And she kicked herself. This was her doing. She had told him that a cabin was among her fantasies. She just wasn't as enamored with the reality of roughing it as she had thought she was.

He could read it all in her expression as he parked the car. "Don't judge a book by its cover, Mary." He was practically grinning.

He fished in his pocket and produced the key. Then he opened the door and flicked on the light.

She had been holding her breath, she realized, and she let it out in a little laugh then. "Oh, thank God."

"Yes, electricity. Not bad, huh?"

As she stepped in and surveyed the place, it was a darn sight better than 'not bad.'

Not only was there electricity, there was a range top and refrigerator. Wood was already stacked by the fireplace. And in the next room there was a lovely queen sized bed with a down comforter. Someone had set the small table in the dining nook and there was a bottle of champagne chilling. With candles laid out, as well.

"You are amazing, Lou. But I knew that."

He put his arms around her from behind. "Do you really like it?"

"Oh, it's fantastic."

He hummed happily as he pressed his lips against her neck. "It should be a lovely few days."

"I couldn't stand to lose you," she told him as she drew his arms around her tighter.

"That's what I've realized these past few months, too."

"I think, we have been through the worst of things."

"You mean you working the early show?" he asked. "That was tough, Mary. Not seeing you Not having you with me more. But it was the best thing too."

"Oh, Lou, how?" she wondered.

"I will never doubt how right it is for us to be together. Because it hurt so badly being apart."

"Oh, exactly."

He couldn't remember ever being so happy.

She continued then. "I was going to wait," she said as she turned to face him. "But I can't. Lou?"

"Hmmm?"

"Will you marry me?"

There was the longest pause while he stared at her. But when he finally answered, she found the wait was worth her while. "You know," he said with a smile that creased his face. "I think I can manage that."


End file.
